I sent this to LOR and hope they can help but thought I would post here to see if any help may come out. I talked with zman about this problem but we couldn't work it out.
I am in a real delima and hope you can give me some help or direction. I committed to buy some 600' of LED rope light and 10 decoders from ATG Electronics direct in China. You can check out their web site and it has full manuals and descriptions on K108T rope lights and 512 decoder listed under controllers. I first ordered and tested out 10 meters of rope and a 300RL DMX controller. I could control this with LOR by using the 300RL on position 36 which is decoder mode. I could locate and recognize the address by hardware refresh and it showed from 9 to 18 addresses depending on number I had set in LOR # units in upper right hand corner of HWU. I could then control lights normally by using # 20 which was first of addresses shown. I could then use channel 1 for red, channel 2 for green, and channel 3 for blue. LOR did a great job of controlling with full ramping, fading, twinkle, ETC. I was told by ATG that their 512 decoder would operate the same way off LOR so I ordered one for test. I have not been able to control any lights with this new 512 decoder. This decoder has reed switches or buttons as they call them from 1 thru 10. 10 is called fun button and in "on" position it operates in default mode and "off" position is decoder mode. I have tried to program different codes into the 512 but LOR can not recognize any of these addresses and keeps displaying 18 codes and they all start with 20 and go to 38. First of problems- I cannot get the data light on iDMX to stop flashing so it is not fully locked on to LOR network. I have tried different USB adapters but nothing seems to help! The same USB cable does control a LOR controller with no problem. The past tests that did control lights also had the flashing data light as it never came steady on but it did control lights! I am using 2.3.6 version so I don't think I have firmware problem. I am powering the iDMX with 12vdc 300ma or 12vdc 1500ma, neither one seems to make a difference. I am using good DMX XLR cable and not mic cable. I am using cat 5e cable to USB adapter. I have not done anything with termination resistors. Have I bought a pig in a poke or do you think I can salvage this and make it work? Any help would be greatly appreciated.
WaterBill
PS I was in contact with John on trying to control this by converting your AC controller output to DC with with 3 full wave bridge rectifiers but had cross over voltage problem on input of the 3 rectifiers. I could make it work with 1/2 wave but lights were not near bright enough so I gave up and went with the decoders. Now I have nothing but empty pockets!
Were you ever able to get this to work in the Manual Mode? As you pointed out, with the first controller, you were not able to get the LED to lock solid, so do not worry about that. I am not so sure that there is not an issue with the unit. Did you get any response from Support?
Charles, yes. That is the unit. In working with Bill, I could never manage to change the Base ID, nor were we able to even control the lights in manual mode.
Thanks for the answer to Charles question and yes Charles that is the unit. No Mark I have not been able to get any light operation under any mode of operation. Now to top it off my 300RL DMX controller has stopped working and had failure of 120vac to 12vdc converter. This is 1 amp unit and Radio Shack only had 1.5 amp converter so I tried it and no go. I also had 300ma converter on hand which I tried with no go also. I am going to find 1 amp converter and see if this gets the 300 back up and running. When it rains it pours!
BILL VANDERSLICE wrote: Now to top it off my 300RL DMX controller has stopped working and had failure of 120vac to 12vdc converter. This is 1 amp unit and Radio Shack only had 1.5 amp converter so I tried it and no go.
If the 1.5 amp converter of proper voltage and connected with the proper polarity did not get a result, then it's a good bet that the DMX controller has gone bye-bye.
Having additional amperage capability should (almost) never cause a problem, where as having reduced capacity as with the 300ma unit almost certainty would with any load at all.
____________________ -- The Doctor, just The Doctor...
Well how interesting! I found new 1 amp converter and the 300RL fired right up and is operating normally with the new 1 amp converter. I agree that it should work with the extra amps but it doesn't. Go figure!
Hey doctor, you are right. I checking out wiring on 1.5 amp converter plug and I reversed polarity to plug and the unit now powers up my 300RL controller. Plug had red & black wires. I assumed other line which was all white but had dashes for markings. I assumed this to be neutral so I mounted to black on this plug line. Put meter to it and now have central pin as positive. Should have used meter in beginning so dumb on me.
No such luck! I have reconnected my 300RL controller by ATG and my LOR DMX does a great job of controlling the rope lights. This tells me the problem is most certainly with the 512 decoder. Since I have no way to manually test this decoder, I don't know if problem is in power side or DMX side of decoder. I have sent pictures and a schematic of how this is wired to the rope lights. It seemed 2 wires were not in sequence and this could be the problem! Will have to wait for reply from them after they look at my info. Will keep you advised and many thanks for your concerns.
This is the main reason we have not purchased any equipment from any Chinese firm for our business.
I am; however, attending the LDI show in Orlando this year and I intend to hit every booth there and see what they have to offer. Hopefully, I will find a Chinese company who has set up a manufacturer's rep here in the States.
Here is the link if anyone else is interested. I can get a few sets of free floor tickets to see the vendor's booths if any of you DMX'ers want to attend. Educational classes are not included in the free package.
The LDI show in Orlando looks interesting and I would love to attend but afraid I would buy more and with my problems right now I don't want to chance adding anymore to them. I think your statement about not buying direct from China might make a lot of sense. I had 120vac to 12vdc adapter go bad after 2 weeks of use and have sent emails on this failure and they have not given me an answer but maybe they are too concerned with my decoder problem to worry about the inverter. Guess I should give them a chance before I badmouth them too bad. I can say this, it makes dealing with LOR a cakewalk comparing to my dealing with the Chinese. I did hear yesterday that I will have answer on decoder problem by Mon which is Sun night for us and it will probably be after midnight before I receive answer. Now how late do I want to stay up!
Update on the 512 decoder. After a week and numerous emails, they have finally decided to send a new 512. I told Dan at LOR that I wanted to hire him out and send him to China to teach them about customer support. They don't have a clue! Now to see how long it takes for replacement unit to get here by DHL.
What sort of prices are they getting for the RGB-LED rope light?
I'm thinking that it should be controllable via the LOR CMB-16D DC controller with a small bit of tinkering. Seems like a bit of overkill to have go the whole DMX + controller route for a rope light.
Even if the DMX controller is a bit dodgy, if the rope light is decent... (for the price)
____________________ -- The Doctor, just The Doctor...
